


The Scent of Death

by minowotaur



Category: Among Us - Fandom
Genre: Blood and Gore, Depiction of Shock, One Shot, References to Drugs, Strong Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-29
Updated: 2020-09-29
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:34:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26710744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minowotaur/pseuds/minowotaur
Summary: After being elected into a position of leadership on the Skeld, Doc must deal with the repercussions that come with the serial murders of the ship’s crew.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 3





	The Scent of Death

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all! This work is inspired by reading the incredible short stories of Sunny Moraine. Please go check out their work when you get a chance.

No matter how many times the rancid scent of death invaded Doc’s nostrils, no amount of experience would ever prepare them for it.

No one bothered to tell students that each scent is unique, spiced to fit the meat it belongs to. It’s never one broad stench that blankets every corpse to ever exist as though a body -- any body -- is a clone of the next. Bodies are unique, it’s one of the reasons for the massive market surrounding human bones. Plastic skeletons don’t provide the same diversity as the bleached bones of a stranger who donated their body to science against the will of their family members because _goddamnit that body is going to further science._

How could anyone predict their skeleton would end up on the desk of a sleep deprived medical student rhythmically pounding out the names of each bone as though it is, in fact, plastic?

How could anyone predict their body would end up mutilated and dragged into the medbay of a ship that floats light years away from the last planet colonized after Earth fell to ruins?

Doc inhaled the metallic scent as though desperate to stay tethered to the sterile room, to remain within the confines of the ship instead of floating off again. Death had a way of tugging a person out to sea and shoving them beneath the current. It drowned anyone who let it, swallowed them whole with disgusting rapture.

“He was ripped open by some fucking monster,” Jack repeated.

It’d been said a dozen times already. Not always directly, but murmured between the anxious crew members who lingered in the hallway outside, pacing holes in the floor and gazing at one another with wild eyes.

Though Doc remained inside beneath the scrutiny of a trembling mechanic, the radiating fear didn’t escape them. Not when it choked every room on the ship like a fire desperate for oxygen.

“Did you see anyone?” The doctor repeated the question.

Jack shook his head. A bead of sweat slipped between his eyes. It mingled with the tears, frightened.

“Who helped you bring back the body?”

“Wynn came in after me. Lookin’ for something, I think.” Jack swallowed. Rubbed his brow. “I don’t remember. I don’t fucking remember, Doc.”

Doc nodded.

“I went to fix the wires,” Jack continued to ramble. “Untangle them. Patch them up. The usual shit, you know? Nothing hard. Not compared to the rest of it.”

For better or worse, Doc opened the floodgates. Jack began to confess everything and nothing.

“I was callin’ his name when I went in. He told me before that he wanted to do something in there. Download shit. Transfer power. I don’t know. _Something_.” Jack licked his lips, gathering sweat away from the cracked skin and tugging it into his mouth. “It smelled fuckin’ wrong in there.”

Doc raised their gaze. Jack smelled it too. Smelled the death of a crew mate, the heat of violence and blood and the shit that no one ever talked about. They told students _that_ in school: Corpses often piss and shit themselves at the time of death. Muscles relax and things come out. A guarantee if the living hell had been scared out of a person beforehand.

“You went in.”

“I fucking had to!” Jack bared his teeth. “I needed to fucking know. I needed to.”

“And now you do.” Doc stepped away from the table and discarded their bloodstained gloves. There was nothing to be saved. They weren’t prepared to do autopsies on a half devoured corpse.

Jack snorted. The wet sound echoed in the empty room. He wiped his nose with the back of his hand and smeared blood against his face like half-assed war paint.

“You didn’t see anyone?” Doc pushed. They nudged the handles of the sink and filled the silence with the hiss of water. “No one entering or leaving? You just walked into a fucking crimescene alone and knelt in front of half a corpse?”

Jack’s gaze burned Doc’s back. The water burned their hands.

“You realize what it looks like, don’t you?”

“I wouldn’t fucking kill him!” Jack rushed forward, stumbling the first few steps, and snagged Doc by the shoulders. Nearly nose to nose, Jack bared his teeth again. Sweat slipped down his temple. “I’m not fucking lying.”

Doc remained still. Their hands hovered over the silver metal of the sink, the hiss of the faucet now joined by the droplets of water that slipped down their fingers.

“Go have a seat, Jack.”

Jack parted his jaws like a starved wolf prepared to turn on its pack. His teeth snapped together with a click and he stepped away.

Doc turned back to the sink. The faucet stopped and the room filled with silence once more.

“You’re in shock.” Doc crossed the room without another glance at Jack’s deflated form. The others prowled outside, snapping their jaws the way Jack had, eyes glaring at the door as they waited for an answer. Unspoken accusations had no doubt been thrown. “Mars will stay with you, keep you company while you process recent events.”

Jack parted his lips only for them to close again, tightening into a thin line. He retreated to the nearest bed and sat on the edge. His gaze returned to the floor, hollow and distant.

For the first time since med school, Doc’s stomach knotted.

It wouldn’t take much more before the rest of the crew splintered, slapping blame onto the nearest target as though the action solved grief and diminished fear.

Doc would find themselves handing out another few tablets for sleep, another few for anxiety, and another few for those who wanted to forget about the guts they saw hanging from the damn ceiling with an unrecognizable corpse splattered against the nearby walls like the shrapnel of a meaty bomb.

How many would show up at the medbay during tonight’s sleep cycle, hands outstretched in prayer to the closest thing to a God that exists light years from any remnant of humanity?

Doc’s feet carried them to the door at the front of the medbay. They mechanically typed a code into the security pad and the door slid open. Doc filled the doorway, white coat splattered with blood.

Eyes turned to them, some red with tears and exhaustion, others wide and white like the panicked gaze of a cow before the slaughter. Questions started to form, bubbling on the lips of those brave enough to speak.

“Mars,” Doc called into the gathered mass. The questions died before they saw the fluorescent light of the hallway. “I need your help keeping Jack calm.”

From around the corner, a small figure slipped into view. Though her gaze held all the fear and uncertainty of the others, no distrust lingered there. Her hands trembled at her side.

Mars had approached Doc the cycle before, reluctantly asking for anything to soothe her anxiety. They hadn’t prepared her for this, she’d told Doc between sobs. They’d spoken of the isolation, the boredom, every inch of mental and emotional stress that comes with confining the human body to a single space adrift in the void. But not _this_.

_Is anyone ever prepared for something like this?_

“Okay,” Mars whispered, the rasp of her voice glass shattering amid the pure silence. She swallowed and forced a smile. “I’ll -- I’ll try.”

Doc stepped aside as Mars squeezed past them, heading for the hunched form of Jack.

At the very least, he wouldn’t be alone. Out of everyone on board, the soft spoken navigator would be the least confrontational. If only Doc’s nurse hadn’t been one of the first to go, they wouldn’t have to resort to recruiting crew members with basic first aid training.

“What about the rest of us?” A gravelly voice demanded. “You leaving us out here to fucking die?”

“What would you like me to do, Colt?” Doc countered.

They’d already had this argument when the last body had been dragged in. Colt had shoved her way to the front of the crowd, pointing a finger into Doc’s chest and shouting as though Hell itself had crawled into her body. Colt wanted something done. She wanted to be _protected_ so she didn’t end up like the other five they’d found. She wanted increased security and a weapon and anything else that they didn’t have the manpower or company permission for.

Colt locked her jaw and crossed her arms, indignant.

“I won’t let you into the medbay while Jack is in such a fragile state,” Doc explained. “All I can advise any of you to do now is to stick together. As I told you before--”

“Cut the shit.” Colt prowled forward. A cat stalking a mouse, burning with hatred and the hunger for answers. “I don’t give a rat’s ass about policy if I’m going to fucking die.”

“Then you can explain to the company when we return why you shouldn’t be thrown in prison for violating the goddamn guidelines.”

Doc stepped back into the medbay. The door slammed shut behind them. Colt and her big mouth would get them all fucked over and, at best, fired. Doc refused to entertain what the worst case scenario might be.

With the sudden absence of the captain and the first mate, Doc had been elected to take charge. It’d almost been unanimous. Only Colt objected. Colt fervently believed it should’ve been her, that she had more experience than some damn egghead who sat in the medbay checking everyone’s piss and monitoring the water samples for an imbalance in pH. In a single unfortunate swoop, they were at odds.

And Colt was determined to undermine every single one of Doc’s actions.

“She’s just scared.” Mars’ large eyes locked desperately onto Doc in a silent plea. “All of us are.”

“Scared people are the most dangerous.”

Mars looked away. Jack remained silent.

“You’re both safer in here than anywhere else.” Doc changed the subject. Another argument about Colt wouldn’t help anyone. “All the attacks have been in remote areas, places that aren’t often bothered with. The two of you will be safe.”

“You’re going somewhere?” Jack’s haunted gaze swiveled upwards. He gestured to the corpse behind the curtain. “Leaving us with -- with that?”

“I have to tend to the others.” Doc shrugged off their stained lab coat in favor of a clean one. “I have to restore order before Colt decides to start a mutiny and eject me.”

Doc tugged the new coat on. A fresh skin for God to wash their hands of sin and tend to the masses. A new suit to gaze upon and be reminded of each prayer God had answered in the darkness of the ship because nothing else reached between the stars to provide even a scrap of solace.

Mars and Jack made no further objections. They huddled together, frightened children tucked beneath the covers with eyes squeezed shut and hearts racing as they waited for the boogie man to step back into the closet.

Doc typed the code back in and stepped into the hallway to tend to their flock, reminding themself all the while that even Lucifer had once been an angel too.


End file.
